


Perfection

by neverminetohold



Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Gen, Introspection, M/M, Self-Harm, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-25
Updated: 2017-09-25
Packaged: 2018-12-25 00:57:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12024729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neverminetohold/pseuds/neverminetohold
Summary: How could he not have known?





	Perfection

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Irusu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Irusu/gifts).



How could he not have known?  
  
The question haunted Danse. He pondered it on his forced march across the wasteland. While returning fire at raiders from behind cover. As his hands were busy cleaning up the abandoned Listening Post he had chosen as his temporary base of operations.  
  
He would stay here, long enough to arrive at a decision. Or until Elder Maxson, bound by duty, made it for him. Danse knew who would be sent. He admired the logic and pragmatic reasoning behind the order, remembered well how his own loyalty to the Brotherhood's cause had been put to the test.  
  
That knowledge was the reason why he had refrained from doing the honorable thing and not yet taken his own life.  
  
His exposure to Nick Valentine through Nate - both good men, calling them anything less would do them a disservice - had done nothing to sway Danse's conviction. The very existence of synths was a danger to mankind.  
  
Perhaps he had been sent by the Institute to infiltrate the Brotherhood, to replace the real Paladin Danse. Perhaps he had been 'liberated,' his memories wiped clean and then cut loose by the Railroad - it did not matter.  
  
He would not be used, not against his fellow brothers and sisters in arms, not against his fellow... against humans.  
  
Danse would rather stand before Nathan, watch him pull the trigger, filled with pride to have sponsored and served with him, of the exemplary officer his... friend had become.  
  
Still... how could he not have known?  
  
Danse knew the answer, his rational mind did not shy away from the truth as his heart and gut did. He had read the files. Eyewitness accounts, autopsy reports, psychological profiles, decoded DNA sequences.  
  
Danse lacked the medical and technical background to understand the finer details, but it boiled down to this: Gen-3 synths were indistinguishable from humans. They were perfect, biological constructs. They have no need for sleep, to consume food and drink, but they could and did. - Especially when they themselves were not aware of their true nature.  
  
The only component that gave them away was a brain implant that showed up on no scanning device available to anyone outside the Institute. Only an autopsy could uncover irrefutable proof.  
  
These thoughts went round and round in Danse's mind. He picked up his knife and nicked the tip of his thumb. Red blood welled up, began to clot in due time. He did it again. And again.  
  
He bled. He scarred. He dreamed. He laughed. He cried. He hated that the man he _loved_ would be sent to kill him, reason and duty be damned.  
  
How could he not have known?


End file.
